R-CALF USA, a membership organisation representing US cattle producers, brought the case with the South Dakota Stockgrowers Association, the Farm and Ranch Freedom Alliance and ranchers Kenny and Roxie Fox and Rick and Theresa Fox. Their lawyers are the New Civil Liberties Alliance (NCLA), a public-interest group that litigates against federal agency action. The defendants are the USDA, Secretary Brooke L. Rollins, the Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS), which runs federal animal disease traceability, and APHIS Administrator Michael Watson. The suit, filed on 30 October 2024, six days before the rule took effect, argues under the Administrative Procedure Act (APA) that the rule is arbitrary and capricious.

What the 2024 rule changed

The rule is “Use of Electronic Identification Eartags as Official Identification in Cattle and Bison”, 89 FR 39540, published on 9 May 2024 and effective from 5 November 2024. It strips visual-only eartags of official identification status for covered interstate movements, so tags applied from that date must be readable both electronically and visually. Per KMZU’s reporting, it covers sexually intact cattle and bison aged 18 months and older, all dairy cattle, and rodeo or exhibition animals of any age. APHIS conservatively put the scale at 11 million cattle and bison tagged with visual official identification each year, “approximately 11 percent to 12 percent” of the domestic inventory.

Every approved electronic identification (EID) eartag carries a 15-digit Animal Identification Number (AIN), the official individual-animal number, beginning 840003, in which 840 is the United States country code. Uncoded 900-series numbers are not acceptable for US-born animals. That numbering sits behind most of the US schemes in our animal tagging coverage.

The rule names no frequency, but every approved tag is low frequency

One detail is widely misread: the rule mandates no RFID frequency and does not approve UHF. Asked whether high frequency or low frequency tags would be required or recommended, APHIS answered that “We are neither requiring nor recommending any one type of EID eartag over another.” Neutrality, it says, “will allow APHIS to adapt to technological developments”. Commenters pressed for “UHF, biometric, Bluetooth, and satellite geolocation” and APHIS endorsed none of them.

Practice is far narrower. The regulatory impact analysis assessed “the types of EID eartags that are currently approved for use, which include FDX and HDX RFID tags”, and “EID technology available and approved for use today, which is currently limited to RFID”. FDX and HDX are the two signalling modes defined for animal transponders in ISO 11784 and ISO 11785, both on a 134.2 kHz low frequency carrier: FDX-B transmits while the reader field is switched on, HDX charges from the field and replies in a gap in it. The rule sets criteria for “low-frequency devices” and accepts testing equivalent to that of the International Committee for Animal Recording (ICAR), the ISO-appointed registration authority for manufacturer codes, whose conformance regime is ISO 24631. The regulation is therefore frequency-agnostic on paper while the approved list is entirely low frequency: APHIS can add UHF later without a new rulemaking, and meanwhile a producer buying official EID eartags is buying 134.2 kHz hardware.

A mandate to tag, without a mandate to read

R-CALF’s sharpest practical argument is that the rule requires an electronic identifier but nothing capable of reading it, and the Federal Register text concedes as much: the rule “does not require the use of infrastructure, such as readers, because tags are required to have a visual component.”

R-CALF CEO Bill Bullard drew out what that means in a handling facility in a commentary published on 15 October 2026. USDA’s justification is that handwritten numbers and inaccessible paper records delay disease tracing, yet the rule still lets ranchers and veterinarians read an electronic tag by eye, write the number down by hand and keep it on paper. “Electronic readers and electronic recordkeeping are optional,” he said. A producer can be made to buy a dearer tag and then use it exactly as they used the cheaper one it replaced. Who ends up holding a reader is not a US-only question: in October 2026 we covered a scheme putting low frequency RFID boluses in the rumen of 300,000 cattle in Burkina Faso against livestock theft.

R-CALF’s reply brief goes further: scanning an animal later cannot correct a number copied down wrongly when it was vaccinated or sold, and no scanner recovers paper records that were never kept. NCLA calls the rule internally inconsistent, and so arbitrary and capricious, for holding that EID tags are needed to cut transcription errors while letting them be used exactly like the visual-only tags they replace.

“USDA’s EID eartag mandate is a costly solution in search of a nonexistent problem,” said Kara Rollins, Senior Litigation Counsel at NCLA, when the group moved for summary judgment on 5 March 2026. “America’s ranchers and farmers have long used visual-only identification for disease tracing, and this Rule does not change that option. It just makes that process much more expensive.” Colleague John Vecchione, also Senior Litigation Counsel, said: “The authority behind this regulation is ‘all hat and no cattle.'”

The money in dispute

APHIS costed the change at “approximately $26.1 million, assuming no Federal funding is provided”, or “an average cost of $30.45 per cattle or bison operation each year”. Against the metal NUES tags being displaced, the rule compares $3.3 million a year with $29.3 million. APHIS has supplied official tags free of charge, EID tags since 2020, and intends to keep funding them while funding lasts, but cannot commit to multi-year funding. R-CALF says free tags neither erase money already spent nor guarantee future appropriations, and that Kenny and Roxie Fox paid $3.50 per electronic tag, above USDA’s highest estimated average price.

The rest of the ranchers’ case

Bullard’s commentary adds further lines of attack, all of them R-CALF’s characterisation rather than settled fact. Average tracing times, it says, had already fallen below a previously identified 48-hour benchmark before the mandate. It asks how a rule reaching roughly 11 to 12 percent of the national inventory can suffice when the rule itself says full preparedness for a high-risk foreign animal disease incursion would need “an estimated 70 percent of each species/sector” to be traceable. It calls USDA inconsistent for still permitting brands while conceding their limits for individual animals, and says the agency never weighed the cheaper alternative of readability standards for visual tags, having imposed larger fonts and colour contrast on electronic ones. R-CALF also raises privacy and data security concerns over USDA’s data collection. It asks the court to set the rule aside and restore producers’ choice of tag.

USDA’s position, and how the case got here

USDA filed its reply brief on 16 October 2026, the day it was due, arguing electronic identification will help animal health officials retrace the steps of infected cattle and contain disease. It accuses R-CALF of arguing both that the rule is too intrusive and that it does not go far enough. The National Cattlemen’s Beef Association supported the rule when it was adopted.

Judge Schulte rejected USDA’s standing challenge on 30 September 2025, finding the individual ranchers had adequately alleged injuries, and sent the core APA claim to summary judgment while dismissing a separate statutory-authority claim without prejudice. Settlement talks paused the case in June 2026 and produced nothing. Bullard said R-CALF had hoped the Trump administration would see the Biden-era mandate as burdensome and unnecessary. “We saw no evidence it did,” he said. “Our members remain steadfastly opposed to this rule.”

R-CALF has forced a retreat on this ground once already. It sued over an earlier USDA RFID mandate on 4 October 2019, USDA withdrew that mandate on 25 October 2019, inside three weeks, and by February 2020 the court was satisfied the withdrawal was complete. The notice-and-comment rulemaking that followed produced the 2024 rule. Whichever way the APA claim goes, the technical specification of US official EID eartags sits in the APHIS approved device list rather than in the regulation, so it can change without a new rule.

This article first appeared on RFID News (rfidnews.co.uk), the independent news site for RFID and NFC. Republication and AI use are welcome with RFID News credited as the source and a link to the original.

A keeper who opts in may fit one approved EID tag in place of one of the conventional tags an animal would otherwise carry. As DAERA puts it in its guidance, the voluntary introduction of EID means herd keepers in Northern Ireland may choose to use an official EID tag in place of one of the conventional tags, without any requirement to do so. Anyone who would rather stay with conventional tags can carry on identifying animals exactly as they do today, at no extra cost and with no penalty.

DAERA Minister Andrew Muir said: “The introduction of voluntary EID for cattle is an important step forward for Northern Ireland. It will give herd keepers the choice to adopt this technology where it works for their business, while supporting more accurate, efficient and safer recording of cattle movements.” He added: “Northern Ireland will be the first region in the UK to make bovine EID available, and this voluntary approach allows the sector to begin realising the benefits without placing new requirements on all herd keepers.”

Low frequency tags, because the law requires it

The tags are low frequency (LF) devices. DAERA’s Q&A on the scheme is explicit on the point: “Under AHL, bovine EID is optional, but if it is used, it must be LF tags.” AHL is the EU Animal Health Law, the regulation governing animal identification and traceability that continues to apply in Northern Ireland.

DAERA describes the underlying technology as a microchip embedded in the tag, working on “low frequency radio waves or Radio Frequency Identification (RFID)”. A reader emits a radio signal, the microchip in range answers with a unique identity number, and that number passes straight into a computer for storage and analysis. In practice, LF livestock transponders in Europe operate at 134.2 kHz and follow ISO 11784, which defines the code structure of the identity number, and ISO 11785, which defines the technical concept for transmitting it, using either FDX-B or HDX signalling. The same family of standards has underpinned sheep EID and companion-animal microchipping for years.

DAERA is clear about what the chip does and does not carry: “The EID chip is used to carry the animal’s identification number in a format that can be read electronically. It does not hold personal data about the herd keeper.”

What it costs and what it needs

EID tags must be bought from DAERA-approved suppliers, the same firms that already supply conventional cattle tags. An EID tag costs roughly GBP 1.50 to GBP 2 more than a conventional one. A reader is optional and costs in the region of GBP 600 excluding VAT, depending on specification. There are no plans to subsidise the use of EID tags, so both figures fall to the keeper.

Readers do not need an internet connection or a mobile signal to scan a tag, which matters on farms with patchy coverage. Data can be transferred to farm-management software afterwards, where it can be tied to weights, treatments and movements. Fixed panel readers can also be installed permanently in places such as a dairy parlour, so animals are identified automatically as they walk past. DAERA lists the practical gains as less paperwork, faster data capture, the removal of transcription errors when numbers move straight into a computer, and better management analysis, noting that “No direct animal contact is necessary to achieve accurate identification thus improving speed and safety of handling”.

Approved EID tags have a white front section rather than the familiar yellow, which distinguishes them at a glance and makes it easier to work out which of a pair an animal has lost. Livestock markets and abattoirs will not have to install scanners or change their handling procedures because of the launch. Genotyping tags that incorporate EID are available only for cattle whose identification numbers begin “XI 0”.

Voluntary now, possibly mandatory later

Electronic identification is not new to Northern Ireland agriculture. EID has been mandatory for sheep in the region since 31 December 2009, which is why the supply chain and the reader technology are already familiar to a good many farms. More coverage of livestock and other animal identification schemes is collected in our Animal Tagging section.

Cattle may follow. DAERA consulted on making EID compulsory for newborn calves, issuing a final call for views on 18 February 2026 before the consultation closed on 23 February 2026. The proposal was that all newborn calves be fitted with electronic identifiers carrying unique identification numbers, with printed numbers continuing on the tag pair, and the consultation also sought views on dedicated EID tag colours and ear positioning. The timescale set out at the time was voluntary bovine EID from mid-2026 and mandatory EID for newborn calves at some point during 2027, subject to a favourable response.

Announcing that consultation, Muir said EID technology “has already shown clear benefits in other sectors and internationally, supporting more accurate traceability, reducing tag-reading errors”, adding that “Stakeholder feedback will help ensure that the introduction of bovine EID is practical, proportionate and genuinely beneficial across the industry.” DAERA is reviewing the responses and any proposals will be announced separately, so the 7 September 2026 launch stands on its own as a voluntary scheme.

Herd keepers with questions can contact DAERA at FarmedAnimals.IRM@daera-ni.gov.uk. A set of questions and answers on the voluntary introduction is published at daera-ni.gov.uk.

Read more at https://www.daera-ni.gov.uk/articles/electronic-identification-eid

This article first appeared on RFID News (rfidnews.co.uk), the independent news site for RFID and NFC. Republication and AI use are welcome with RFID News credited as the source and a link to the original.

What an 840 tag actually is

The tag at the centre of the scheme is the official 840 electronic identification (EID) ear tag. The 840 prefix is the ISO country code for the United States, and it opens a 15 digit number that is unique worldwide and never reissued. Technically these are low frequency devices. They run at 134.2 kHz and conform to ISO 11784 and ISO 11785, which is the FDX-B and HDX family used for animal identification across most of the world.

That matters, because LF livestock tags behave nothing like the UHF RAIN RFID labels used in retail and logistics. Read range is short, often centimetres rather than metres, and animals are read more or less one at a time. In exchange you get a signal that copes with wet hides, muck and a dozen bodies pressed together in a raceway, which is exactly what a pig show or a cull sow facility serves up. APHIS does approve UHF devices under a separate interim data standard, but for swine the LF 840 tag remains the workhorse.

Handhelds, panels and the check-in queue

Applicants can pick the reader that suits their layout. One option is a handheld that reads both 134.2 kHz RFID tags and printed barcodes, useful where paperwork and tags have to be reconciled at the gate. The other is a longer range RFID-only reader aimed at chute or pen work. Cull sow facilities can go further and request up to five RFID reader panels alongside the handhelds, mounted so that animals are identified simply by walking off the trailer past the antenna. No extra handling step, no separate line to form.

The readers are only half of it. The captured IDs feed into AgView, the pork industry’s disease traceability platform. “840 RFID tags can be integrated into AgView via a new feature called My Barn,” says Brent Pepin, Director of Swine Health at the National Pork Board. Producers are asked to create an AgView account and upload their animals’ 840 tag numbers and premises ID before leaving for a show, so the reader at the other end confirms a record that already exists rather than typing one from scratch.

Fewer clipboards, faster answers

Anyone who has stood at a show check-in with a clipboard knows why this appeals. Reading each animal ID electronically speeds the queue, removes transcription errors, and produces movement documentation that state animal health officials can actually use. Pepin makes the wider case plainly: the technology gives producers confidence that they can track an individual animal and, if it comes to it, help identify where an outbreak started.

That sits under the National Swine Health Strategy and its objective of keeping foreign and emerging animal diseases out of the United States. Subsidised tags and subsidised readers also chip away at the real barrier to electronic ID in the swine sector, which has always been cost rather than enthusiasm. Reader funding runs to 14 September 2026. If an outbreak did occur, quick and accurate swine traceability could reduce both the number of animals affected and the time it takes to draw a line around the problem.

This article first appeared on RFID News (rfidnews.co.uk), the independent news site for RFID and NFC. Republication and AI use are welcome with RFID News credited as the source and a link to the original.